@ARTICLE{Politowski20-IST-BlobAndSpaghetti,
   AUTHOR       = {Cristiano Politowski and Foutse Khomh and Simone Romano and 
      Giuseppe Scanniello and Fabio Petrillo and Yann-Ga�l Gu�h�neuc and 
      Abdou Maiga},
   JOURNAL      = {Information and Software Technology (IST)},
   TITLE        = {A Large Scale Empirical Study of the Impact of Spaghetti 
      Code and Blob Anti-patterns on Program Comprehension},
   YEAR         = {2020},
   MONTH        = {June},
   NOTE         = {17 pages.},
   OPTNUMBER    = {},
   PAGES        = {106278},
   VOLUME       = {122},
   EDITOR       = {G�nther Ruhe},
   KEYWORDS     = {Topic: <b>Code and design smells</b>, Venue: <b>IST</b>},
   PUBLISHER    = {Elsevier},
   URL          = {http://www.ptidej.net/publications/documents/IST20a.doc.pdf},
   ABSTRACT     = {\textbf{Context.} Several studies investigated the 
      impact of anti-patterns (i.e., poor solutions to recurring design 
      problems) during maintenance activities and reported that 
      anti-patterns significantly affect the developers' effort required to 
      edit files. However, before developers edit files, they must 
      understand the source code of the systems. This source code must be 
      easy to understand by developers. \textbf{Objective.} In this work, 
      we provide a complete assessment of the impact of two instances of 
      two anti-patterns, Blob or Spaghetti Code, on program comprehension. 
      \textbf{Method.} We analyze the impact of these two anti-patterns 
      through three empirical studies conducted at Polytechnique Montr{\'e} 
      al (Canada) with 24 participants; at Carlton University (Canada) with 
      30 participants; and at University Basilicata (Italy) with 79 
      participants. \textbf{Results.} We collect data from 372 tasks 
      obtained thanks to 133 different participants from the three 
      universities. We use three metrics to assess the developers' 
      comprehension of the source code: (1) the duration to complete each 
      task; (2) their percentage of correct answers; and, (3) the NASA task 
      load index for their effort. \textbf{Conclusions.} We report that, 
      although single occurrences of Blob or Spaghetti code anti-patterns 
      have little effect on code comprehension, two occurrences of either 
      Blob or Spaghetti Code significantly increases the developers' time 
      spent in their tasks, reduce their percentage of correct answers, and 
      increase their effort. Hence, we recommend that developers act on 
      both anti-patterns, which should be refactored out of the source code 
      whenever possible. We also recommend further studies on combinations 
      of anti-patterns rather than on single anti-patterns one at a time.}
}

{"_id":"XEckb4GWDSCBuy66n","bibbaseid":"politowski-khomh-romano-scanniello-petrillo-guhneuc-maiga-alargescaleempiricalstudyoftheimpactofspaghetticodeandblobantipatternsonprogramcomprehension-2020","authorIDs":["AfJhKcg96muyPdu7S"],"author_short":["Politowski, C.","Khomh, F.","Romano, S.","Scanniello, G.","Petrillo, F.","Gu�h�neuc, Y.","Maiga, A."],"bibdata":{"bibtype":"article","type":"article","author":[{"firstnames":["Cristiano"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Politowski"],"suffixes":[]},{"firstnames":["Foutse"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Khomh"],"suffixes":[]},{"firstnames":["Simone"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Romano"],"suffixes":[]},{"firstnames":["Giuseppe"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Scanniello"],"suffixes":[]},{"firstnames":["Fabio"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Petrillo"],"suffixes":[]},{"firstnames":["Yann-Ga�l"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Gu�h�neuc"],"suffixes":[]},{"firstnames":["Abdou"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Maiga"],"suffixes":[]}],"journal":"Information and Software Technology (IST)","title":"A Large Scale Empirical Study of the Impact of Spaghetti Code and Blob Anti-patterns on Program Comprehension","year":"2020","month":"June","note":"17 pages.","optnumber":"","pages":"106278","volume":"122","editor":[{"firstnames":["G�nther"],"propositions":[],"lastnames":["Ruhe"],"suffixes":[]}],"keywords":"Topic: <b>Code and design smells</b>, Venue: <b>IST</b>","publisher":"Elsevier","url":"http://www.ptidej.net/publications/documents/IST20a.doc.pdf","abstract":"\\textbfContext. Several studies investigated the impact of anti-patterns (i.e., poor solutions to recurring design problems) during maintenance activities and reported that anti-patterns significantly affect the developers' effort required to edit files. However, before developers edit files, they must understand the source code of the systems. This source code must be easy to understand by developers. \\textbfObjective. In this work, we provide a complete assessment of the impact of two instances of two anti-patterns, Blob or Spaghetti Code, on program comprehension. \\textbfMethod. We analyze the impact of these two anti-patterns through three empirical studies conducted at Polytechnique Montré al (Canada) with 24 participants; at Carlton University (Canada) with 30 participants; and at University Basilicata (Italy) with 79 participants. \\textbfResults. We collect data from 372 tasks obtained thanks to 133 different participants from the three universities. We use three metrics to assess the developers' comprehension of the source code: (1) the duration to complete each task; (2) their percentage of correct answers; and, (3) the NASA task load index for their effort. \\textbfConclusions. We report that, although single occurrences of Blob or Spaghetti code anti-patterns have little effect on code comprehension, two occurrences of either Blob or Spaghetti Code significantly increases the developers' time spent in their tasks, reduce their percentage of correct answers, and increase their effort. Hence, we recommend that developers act on both anti-patterns, which should be refactored out of the source code whenever possible. We also recommend further studies on combinations of anti-patterns rather than on single anti-patterns one at a time.","bibtex":"@ARTICLE{Politowski20-IST-BlobAndSpaghetti,\r\n AUTHOR = {Cristiano Politowski and Foutse Khomh and Simone Romano and \r\n Giuseppe Scanniello and Fabio Petrillo and Yann-Ga�l Gu�h�neuc and \r\n Abdou Maiga},\r\n JOURNAL = {Information and Software Technology (IST)},\r\n TITLE = {A Large Scale Empirical Study of the Impact of Spaghetti \r\n Code and Blob Anti-patterns on Program Comprehension},\r\n YEAR = {2020},\r\n MONTH = {June},\r\n NOTE = {17 pages.},\r\n OPTNUMBER = {},\r\n PAGES = {106278},\r\n VOLUME = {122},\r\n EDITOR = {G�nther Ruhe},\r\n KEYWORDS = {Topic: <b>Code and design smells</b>, Venue: <b>IST</b>},\r\n PUBLISHER = {Elsevier},\r\n URL = {http://www.ptidej.net/publications/documents/IST20a.doc.pdf},\r\n ABSTRACT = {\\textbf{Context.} Several studies investigated the \r\n impact of anti-patterns (i.e., poor solutions to recurring design \r\n problems) during maintenance activities and reported that \r\n anti-patterns significantly affect the developers' effort required to \r\n edit files. However, before developers edit files, they must \r\n understand the source code of the systems. This source code must be \r\n easy to understand by developers. \\textbf{Objective.} In this work, \r\n we provide a complete assessment of the impact of two instances of \r\n two anti-patterns, Blob or Spaghetti Code, on program comprehension. \r\n \\textbf{Method.} We analyze the impact of these two anti-patterns \r\n through three empirical studies conducted at Polytechnique Montr{\\'e} \r\n al (Canada) with 24 participants; at Carlton University (Canada) with \r\n 30 participants; and at University Basilicata (Italy) with 79 \r\n participants. \\textbf{Results.} We collect data from 372 tasks \r\n obtained thanks to 133 different participants from the three \r\n universities. We use three metrics to assess the developers' \r\n comprehension of the source code: (1) the duration to complete each \r\n task; (2) their percentage of correct answers; and, (3) the NASA task \r\n load index for their effort. \\textbf{Conclusions.} We report that, \r\n although single occurrences of Blob or Spaghetti code anti-patterns \r\n have little effect on code comprehension, two occurrences of either \r\n Blob or Spaghetti Code significantly increases the developers' time \r\n spent in their tasks, reduce their percentage of correct answers, and \r\n increase their effort. Hence, we recommend that developers act on \r\n both anti-patterns, which should be refactored out of the source code \r\n whenever possible. We also recommend further studies on combinations \r\n of anti-patterns rather than on single anti-patterns one at a time.}\r\n}\r\n\r\n","author_short":["Politowski, C.","Khomh, F.","Romano, S.","Scanniello, G.","Petrillo, F.","Gu�h�neuc, Y.","Maiga, A."],"editor_short":["Ruhe, G."],"key":"Politowski20-IST-BlobAndSpaghetti","id":"Politowski20-IST-BlobAndSpaghetti","bibbaseid":"politowski-khomh-romano-scanniello-petrillo-guhneuc-maiga-alargescaleempiricalstudyoftheimpactofspaghetticodeandblobantipatternsonprogramcomprehension-2020","role":"author","urls":{"Paper":"http://www.ptidej.net/publications/documents/IST20a.doc.pdf"},"keyword":["Topic: <b>Code and design smells</b>","Venue: <b>IST</b>"],"metadata":{"authorlinks":{"gu�h�neuc, y":"https://bibbase.org/show?bib=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.yann-gael.gueheneuc.net%2FWork%2FPublications%2FBiblio%2Fcomplete-bibliography.bib&msg=embed"}},"downloads":0},"bibtype":"article","biburl":"http://www.yann-gael.gueheneuc.net/Work/Publications/Biblio/complete-bibliography.bib","creationDate":"2020-09-16T17:55:32.066Z","downloads":0,"keywords":["topic: <b>code and design smells</b>","venue: <b>ist</b>"],"search_terms":["large","scale","empirical","study","impact","spaghetti","code","blob","anti","patterns","program","comprehension","politowski","khomh","romano","scanniello","petrillo","gu�h�neuc","maiga"],"title":"A Large Scale Empirical Study of the Impact of Spaghetti Code and Blob Anti-patterns on Program Comprehension","year":2020,"dataSources":["8vn5MSGYWB4fAx9Z4","KfXmPhaoCuAwjS2aX","SCHo5ZZkXuxNNaMME","cy4HQkWZAA34xFEsF","HGSdZxjT9bHyLwMDX"]}